Real estate agents, banks, developers,
bond originators and government must
do more to close the gap between
homeowners and those who would like
to own homes, says Rudi Botha, chief
executive of BetterBond.
A decade ago, a survey by the
Reader’s Digest magazine showed that
65% of South African consumers were in
favour of home ownership, and the latest
statistics show that nothing much has
changed since then – except the size of
the population.
“The latest homeowner sentiment
survey conducted by Absa shows that
a comparable 67% of South African
consumers are currently positive about
the benefits of owning a home rather
than renting one,” Botha says.
“But the
population of South Africa has increased
from 49.5 million to 56.5 million over the
past 10 years, so the actual number of
people in favour of home ownership is
now considerably higher than it was then.”